In my last post, Beerfest. Prost!, I promised you more on the foodie culture in Munich.

Munich really surprised me in this department. Spain, Italy and Greece, where we had just spent the past month and a half, very much had food as a central part of our adventures (in fact, I’m desperate to go back to Italy literally just for a bowl of pasta), but these are not exactly countries with foodie cultures. The food is excellent and authentic, but eating out is not an ‘experience’ as you would describe it as such in, say, a typical Melbourne café. And then came Germany, which apparently is vastly different in this respect.

It all began on our first morning in Munich, when we left our apartment on the lookout for a brekky spot. The evening before, when lugging our (well, really, my) oversized suitcases, backpacks and carry bags to our apartment, I had spotted what looked like a cool café and just had to go back.

Using my not so great sense of direction, we eventually found it – Kaffebar Aroma: a funky décor, low-stooled, big mugged café. It was just what I felt like and just what I had been missing the past few weeks. Despite the fact that my various dietaries pose quite a few restrictions on eating brekky out (i.e. brekky features lots of eggs, dairy and avocado), I still love going out for a good ol’ breakfast. But breakfast in the former countries we had visited usually consisted of coffee and a croissant (which I’m definitely not complaining about, but basically breakfast options were pretty minimal). So, I was pretty excited to find this café, with a fully-fledged breakfast menu. Especially, that is, when I looked at the menu and noticed that they had ‘on tap’ lactose free milk! This was a fantastic discovery for this lactard, after having missed a good milky coffee for the last 2 months. This is hard enough to find in a Melbourne café, let alone in the middle of Europe (or so I would have thought). The staff were nice, the food was good and the coffee was just pure deliciousness. It even ticked the BF’s criteria: big mug = bigger portion sizes.

Whilst I don’t like to frequent the same place too often when travelling, given we were living in an AirBnB apartment, Kaffebar Aroma became our local morning coffee stop. Who says you don’t need coffee before beer…

Kaffebar Aroma interior

Kaffebar Aroma low stool exterior

We also went to a nearby bakery one day, which had enticed us inside by the colourful and delicious pretzel display in the window. We were deciding what to buy, and discussing my nut allergy with the staff, when a German local interrupted us. He kindly informed me that just down the street was a bakery which caters for allergies. Fantastic! Once we eventually found the place he was referring to, we were helped by their friendly staff into buying a selection of pretzels and pastries which were Allergian-safe. And let’s just say: Munich’s pretzels are significantly better than the much-anticipated-yet-highly-disappointing New York pretzels!

Pretzels everywhere!

My final great discovery was made when we were at the local grocery store, stocking up on some supplies for our apartment. They had a whole ‘dietary requirements’ section in the little store, packed full of lactose free, gluten free, etc items! I had a ball. *note: one of the Cadbury-equivalent, plain dairy milk chocolates, Milka, (which I saw in Munich and Amsterdam) contains hazelnuts.

At every other place we ate at in Munich, my allergies were pretty easy to deal with. All staff understood well, dealt with them appropriately and I never felt that it wasn’t taken seriously.

Even at Oktoberfest, there was plenty of food options (generally, pretzels, schnitzel and chips are pretty safe options). I usually ate at the food stalls outside the beer halls and the staff working there were also really friendly and helpful.

A few other food recommendations:

Hey Luigi: This place was right by our apartment. We ordered the veal schnitzel, which is served with roast potatoes and salad. This was seriously delicious and was a huge serving of food (which the BF loved). I would definitely recommend this place – cool atmosphere, nice staff and is open late!

Hey Luigi

L’Amar: We ate lunch here one day and I had a really great bowl of pumpkin risotto. This was like a delicious home cooked meal (that I had really missed for the past 8 weeks or so)!

So very appropriately named. Joy is a little chain gourmet cupcake store in Melbourne that I’ve just discovered.

Joy is one of those cutesy boutique stores (2 in Melbourne CBD, one in Chadstone shopping centre and one in Doncaster) with every cupcake flavour under the sun. Each one looks more delicious than the last. Salted caramel… red velvet… dark chocolate… rhubarb… lemon meringue… jam donut… cinnamon sugar… you name it – they’ve probably got it.

I first went to Joy to get a co-worker a little birthday treat. As I began gazing at all the delicious bundles of Joy in front of me (knowing full well that Allergians don’t really get to indulge in such treats), I saw a big sign with familiar lettering – NF, DF, GF, V. I don’t know why I even thought to ask, but for some reason I did:

Allergian: “when you say ‘nut free’, what exactly do you mean?”.

Expecting the normal answer of ‘well, there’s no nuts in the cupcakes, but there may be traces and…’ I then noticed that the all-familiar normality of cakes/desserts littered with nuts was non-existent. There were in fact only one or two cupcake flavours with nuts, and these were banished away to the corner (just the way the “NF, GF, DF, often taste free cupcakes normally are!).

Nice lady behind the counter: “The NF cupcakes are entirely nut free and are made in an entirely different factory.”*

But a few weeks later, I was doing some shopping in Chaddy and walked past this joyful cupcake stall again. I thought I’d treat myself (shopping is cardio right?). I asked the lady behind the counter again, in case this store was different to the Melbourne CBD store.

Well – you betycha – I received the same response. Entirely NF. No traces, no risk of traces. I think it’s interesting that Joy doesn’t market themselves as the highly allergy-friendly place that they are. Whilst I cannot judge their cupcakes against those of other similar stores, based on the number of people in their stores, they either clearly make great cupcakes or there are a lot of people with allergies.

So I took the plunge. Even though I eat at restaurants that serve nuts and eat packaged foods which say “may contain traces of nuts”, this seemed too good to be true. It was way too foreign to be ordering a cake/dessert at one of these boutique dessert stores.

I thoroughly enjoyed my cupcake (ok fine I had two, but who’s judging?). I ordered a salted caramel and a dark chocolate and they were so gooood!

As I bit into these delicious cupcakes, and brought joy to the little girl in me (who had missed out on all the deliciousness that most little kiddies get to enjoy), I realised just how easy it was for this little cupcake store to bring joy to us Allergians. THANK YOU JOY – I thought you deserved a special mention!!

* Disclaimer: I’m not sure whether this is the same for the other types of Allergens. Please make your own enquiries before consuming!

Ios town is full of bars, shops and restaurants. The interesting thing about Ios is that (just about) no one actually lives on the island. Those Greeks who do reside on the island actually come from surrounding areas, largely Athens, for the tourist season and return to their home once the summer is over. And for every Greek person working on the island, there are probably 5 tourists working in Ios (predominantly Australians). This pretty much means that the whole island is dedicated to, and full of, tourists (again, largely from Australia). This gave Ios a strange familiarity, despite never having been before.

The view of Ios Town from our hotel room.

Mylopotas Beach

We arrived in Ios on the 12th of September, which was around the time of the last wave of people to the island for the year. Shops and restaurants were already starting to close up and the island had started to die down (though there were still plenty of people). My advice: if you want to feel the buzz of the place, try get to Ios slightly earlier, and definitely not after, 15th September to ensure you don’t miss out on what the island is all about. For example, Far Out beach club, one of the top party venues, had pretty much died down by this time of year.

However, if you are around in September and feel that the place is dead, do not fear. The crowds will miraculously appear at about 1.30/2.00 am and continue well into the night. Unlike in, say, Mykonos, where the streets were always packed full of people, Ios Town is dead quiet until people are ready to party (including during the day). Most people spend the day sleeping, by the hotel pool or at the beach.

There isn’t a whole lot to see and do in Ios. We spent most of our days by the pool or at Mylopotas Beach (by Far Out beach club), meandering through the town checking out the tourist shops [one massive sucker for souvenirs right here], bar hopping in the evening and, of course, eating! There are also a lot of water sports offered on Mylopotas Beach. Greece was about half way through our Eurotrip so it was the perfect chance to unwind, relax & recuperate (mostly our feet), save some money (our daily spend was well below the rest of the trip’s) and get prepared for the final jam-packed month of our trip (cue: Oktoberfest).

Now.. a bit about the food in Ios.

I know that I probably shouldn’t publicly admit to having Italian food in Greece (who does that?) but here goes… when the thought of another gyro made me cringe because of the recent burst of gyro consumption and we had begun reminiscing of our days in Italy, we luckily stumbled upon Ciao Bella, an Italian restaurant complete with a chef from Florence. How could we turn it down? The restaurant had a cosy set up – seated on cushions on the floor – and had lovely staff. Luckily, the food was delicious [and no, I’m not just saying that] and exactly what my body needed to prepare itself for some more gyro-packed days. I ordered some sort of a tagliatelle pasta with beef and spinach.. coupled with a perfecto serve of sangria [yes, I visited 3 countries in 1 night], it was a very tasty meal.

Our meal at Ciao Bella

Our meal at Ciao Bella

We also ate one night at Global Gourmet, which is in the main town. I ordered the lamb chops and roast potatoes. The lamb was super tender and juicy and, though a little bland, was really enjoyable. While I didn’t have dessert, I eyed the BF’s delicious Greek yoghurt and honey, which seemed like a winner.

My meal at Global Gourmet

Finally, we had our fair share of gyros while in Ios and, as always, each one was better than the next. There was one place (and I cannot for the life of me remember the name) that stays open all year long. The gyros at this place were pretty damn good. I think Pleasure is supposed to be one of the best.

There are lots of different cuisine options in Ios – I frequently spotted Mexican, Thai and Italian. There seemed to be something for everyone, though it is a bit tricky to research good eats or, even more so, locate them. There are plenty of cheap casual gyro-type restaurants, which are all cheap, deliciously fattening and drool-worthy.

In Ios, bar/club hopping is a must do. There are bars/clubs scattered throughout Ios town and you will often find that one minute a bar/club is packed full and the next it is empty (as everyone has moved onto the next place). There are also more chilled places where you can sit all night along the main strip, as well as more sophisticated/elegant bars along the outskirts of the main town (near the main road).

Definitely visit Orange Bar. They have the most amazing selection of shots, such as cappuccino, mint aero, maltesers, baclava, keylime pie and bounty. I, of course, could not have these because there were some nutty ones, but they are supposed to be incredible and taste like the real thing!

The shots at Orange Bar.

One bar to experience while you are in Ios is Slammer Bar. Now you are probably going to think I’m crazy, but I promise you I’m not making this up. At this mysterious place, Slammer Bar, if you choose to order the Slammer shot, you will drink a shot and then the barman will give you a helmet to put on and will hit you over the head [very hard, in fact] with an item of your choice. I did not take part in this activity (my head is way too precious), but it was mildly entertaining watching highly intoxicated people have their head slammed with a fire extinguisher, obviously thinking it was a good idea at the time.

I had a ball eating in Greece. I hadn’t eaten too much Greek food before visiting Greece, but realizing that the Greek cuisine pretty much consists of various forms of meat, I knew it would be a winner.

The next 9 or so days involved eating far more gyros than I’d like to admit. But when they taste that good and cost 2 euro (about AU$3.50!!), how could I pass it up???

The gyros in Greece (pronounced “iros” [… or something like that]) comprise your choice of meat, some salad, tzatziki and chips in a delicious pita bread. I always ordered the chicken, because, to my surprise, lamb gyros weren’t all that common in Greece. I had to leave out the tzatziki (because of the lactose), so it probably wasn’t quite as delicious as it otherwise would be, but it was still pretty darn good.

I found that wherever you went, the gyros were amazing. You don’t need to go to some fancy restaurant to get good food in Greece – and in fact, I think the less fancy, the more authentic.

The two best gyros I had in Mykonos were at Tropicana (surprisingly, given it is essentially a bar) and at Saki’s Grill House (which is known to be the best gyro in Mykonos). The Saki’s Grill gyros were huge and the pita bread, in particular, was to die for. I’d definitely recommend a visit! The Tropicana gyros tasted delicious and could be enjoyed while lounging on the beach soaking up the sun!

Tropicana

Saki’s Grill House

We also decided one night to splurge a little. The BF and I met up with 2 other friends and we went to a restaurant for a feast. Many of the restaurants offer these giant mixed plates to share between 2. We got chicken shashlik, chicken wings, sausages, hamburgers, pita, dips, chips and more. It was 26 euro for 2 people (about $38 for 2) which was pretty good value because we were popping afterwards! Apologies for the awful photos and, no, this wasn’t the full platter.

Our feast

Our feast

The thing I loved about this restaurant [and sorry I can’t remember the name], apart from the delicious and never-ending plate of food, was the ambiance. I remember it so clearly. You sit outdoors in the heat in a giant space cluttered full with tables, people, food and chatter. It was a hullabaloo, an organised chaos, an exciting pandemonium; it was wonderfully atmospheric.

Let me talk a bit about my allergies in Mykonos.

I don’t think that allergies are particularly common in Greece. Generally, when I gave my beautiful Greek nut translation sign, people thought I was a little bit crazy. I’d say that Greek people had a bit more of a blasé attitude towards allergies as compared to those in Italy and Spain, but that was possibly because of the nature of the food, in that there was probably no way that there would be nuts inside a gyro and therefore they thought I was crazy for asking. I wouldn’t say that they were careless about my allergies, but just that it wasn’t taken quite as seriously. I did, however, usually get a better response to my allergies when I was eating at hotel restaurants/bars (eg at Paradise Beach), where the staff are probably more accustomed to dealing with allergies.

This being said, however, I felt like I didn’t need to worry as much about my allergies because it was always pretty obvious what I was eating. You could see the gyro meat being cut off the spit in front of you, or you knew that you were eating plain meat without any sauce. There wasn’t anything snuck in there. I had also done a bit of research with my Greek friend, who gave me the low down, and so I knew that nuts are not particularly common in the Greek cuisine, but are quite common in Greek pastries/desserts (eg Baklava).

What I did love about Mykonos was that I got to enjoy dessert. Say what? OK well not dessert, per se, but let’s just call it that. You’ve all (hopefully) read about my disappointment in not being able to enjoy the exciting desserts in Spain and Italy, which generally consisted of nutty or potentially nutty delights. In Mykonos, when lying on the beach in the scorching sun, a delicious ice cream is exactly what one craves. Paradise Beach has a lovely little set up where you can get just about anything (there are restaurants, bars and also a little canteen-ey type place where you can get all sorts of snacks). I went to go look at what ice cream options they had and unfortunately faced a whole lot of gibberish (Greek) ingredients. Until I found the packaged Häagen-Dazs ice cream tubs – complete with English ingredients. Woohoo!

These were mini tubs and there were heaps of different options to choose from. Whilst there were 1 or 2 that contained nuts (but not peanuts), most of the flavours were nut free. The first one I had was crème brulee, which was beyond amazing. The ice cream had chunks of caramel inside, dripping with crème brulee sauce (which tasted a lot like real crème brulee). The second flavour I tried was the chocolate fondant. Wow was it good! It was chocolate ice cream with chunks of brownie, drenched in chocolate sauce. It was definitely worth cheating on the lactose intolerance front! Who needs an Italian hot chocolate or some sort of delicious Spanish pastry when you have Häagen-Dazs ice cream!? Ok I realise that for most non-Allergians, this isn’t all that exciting and it’s probably no comparison, but I’ll take what I can get.

For the vegetarians – I’m sure you would know to expect (almost) nothing but meat in Greece. There’s always the salad option though, and of course lots of cheese. Being an island, I’m pretty sure there were some fish/seafood dishes/restaurants on offer, but meat was the overwhelming majority.

For those allergic to dairy / the lactards – the Greek cuisine is full of dairy – between the tzatsiki, the halloumi, the Greek yoghurt and the feta, there’s plenty of it. That being said, however, it is easy to avoid these things and you can almost always leave the dairy out. There’s always something else to eat.

Some final words about Mykonos:

Ouzo. It’s the Greek specialty liqueur, more particularly, an anise-flavoured aperitif. AKA, if you don’t like liquorice, do not try this. My friends and I bought a bottle and were told to drink it 1 part ouzo, 3 parts water. I smelt the bottle and (as an avid liquorice-hater) could not bring myself to drink it [I think I was still scarred from the limoncello and grappa in Italy]. The far more daring 3 guys I was with took on the challenge and drank their shots of Ouzo and I got to enjoy the looks on their faces once they were downed. Classic!

Rome continued our streak of delicious food, jam-packed touring, hot summer days and nights, and drinking vino with every meal.

Rome was a tough one on our feet. My poor little feet. They just didn’t know what was ahead of them.

We decided to stay near Termini station at the lovely Al Viminale Hill Inn & Hotel. This was a great location – easy to get to from the station (perfect for lugging the increasingly heavy suitcase, the ever expanding number of carry bags and my consequent impressively enlarging bicep muscles), located along a strip of restaurants and easy to get to anywhere in Rome.

In case you don’t quite believe me, this was our collection of bags by the end of the trip.

But.. really, when I say “easy to get to anywhere”, I mean “get those walking shoes on because you’ve got a long trek ahead of you”. No one really warned us, but the public transport in Rome is pretty much non-existent and exceptionally confusing (the one time we took a bus we ended up in the entirely wrong area), so it’s usually easier to walk. But when we looked at a map in Rome, we didn’t quite grasp just how far away things were. It seemed like we could walk to just about anywhere. But what may have seemed like a short walk from the hotel to a tourist site sometimes ended up taking us almost an hour.

What this meant was that once we left the hotel in the morning, we were gone for the day. It would take too long to come home in between our day adventures and dinner, so we would end up getting dinner wherever we were out and about and then continuing on into the night. My poor little feet.

Despite the pain inflicted upon my feet, I think that walking really is the best way to get to know a city. Getting to know the streets, stumbling upon awesome sights/restaurants/shops, and seeing all the different areas is one of my favourite parts of a holiday. Especially when you stay in a place for long enough to feel like you have “your street” or “your coffee shop” etc. This was something that really resonated with me in Florence.

Despite the walking, Rome is such an incredible city. You can be walking through the middle of the city and suddenly stumble upon some ancient ruins. Or some giant building that looks like a wedding cake. Or a Colosseum! The city just oozes with history and culture that I don’t think is replicated anywhere else in the world. It is also jam packed full of tourist attractions, one of the world’s great museums (Vatican Museum), great food, shopping streets, cafes / gelaterias and talented entertainers (like an awesome group of musicians who play on Piazza Navona).

Some ancient ruins

The “wedding cake” building

The Colosseum

Performers at Piazza Navona

In Rome, we filled our 6 days with the following (and then some):

The Colosseum + Palatine Hill (go on a tour of the Colosseum and make sure you also see the outside at night!)

Vatican + St Peter’s Basilica (I was amazeddd by St Peter’s Basilica)

Seeing the wedding cake building (National Monument to Victor Emmanuel II) (we actually stumbled upon this building and didn’t realise until later that it was the infamous “wedding cake building”)

Trevi Fountain (although for us, this was really just a monument of scaffolding)

Capuchin crypt (only if you can deal with a bit of gore.. it’s a bit creepy to say the least)

Piazza Navona (I loved sitting in Piazza Navona at just about any time of day people watching, admiring the fountains, and watching the performers)

The Pantheon (visit at night too)

Walk along Fiume Tevere

Check out the viewpoint at Gianicolo park

Mouth of Truth

Campidoglio

Spanish Steps (a great place to chill, rest your legs and people watch)

Porta Portese flea markets

Visit the Roman ghetto

Walk along Via Guilia (a street full of palaces)

Pincian Hill / Piazza Bucarest / Piazza del Popolo

Eat great food

Drink vino with every meal

Splurge on every dessert imaginable (food allergy dependent)

Shop your heart out

St. Peter’s Basilica

Piazza Navona

The Pantheon

The Spanish Steps

We ate plenty of delicious Italian food in Roma, with my allergies/dietary requirements being pretty easy to deal with. We ate at a few places that had been recommended to us, and some that we stumbled upon during our journeys, but overall had some great meals. I didn’t have any nut run-ins, but I do have a few stories to share, as well as some great restaurant recommendations, so stay tuned for my next post about beautiful Rome!

As I’ve recently started full time work, I’ve started looking for some new snacks for either mid-morning (when lunch time hunger creeps in a bit early) or as an afternoon pick-me-up (when the lethargy kicks in).

I found this recipe for delicious bran muffins. The mixture goes a long way (I halved the recipe and it made about 15-20 muffins) and is really quick and easy to make. The smell of the muffins baking is to-die for and the taste is pretty damn good.

So here goes:

Ingredients:

1 packet of Bran Flakes (350g)

3 cups brown sugar

5 teaspoons of bicarbonate soda

2x 500ml carton of buttermilk. This can also be replaced with lactose free yoghurt or soy yoghurt. For a half recipe, I used 3x 140g tubs of vanilla lactose free yoghurt

For all you dessert lovers out there, I hope you’ve read Part 1 of this post which discussed why my ability to enjoy desserts in Florence was less than successful, to my dismay. With all the Nutella served as a topping on waffles and crepes, the nut-flavoured gelatos, the peanut-coated gelato cones and the nutty chocolate goodies, nuts were everywhere in this sweeter side of Florence. Luckily I am sweet enough already. Oh, but the smell of waffles wafting through the air…. Torture.

I was desperate to try some gelato in Florence.

I am a huge ice cream fan. And Italy is famous for gelato.

No.1 ice cream fan + world’s best ice cream should = a perfect combo.

In Florence, I looked, without fail, at every single gelateria in the desperate (hopeless) attempt to find a place that didn’t have any nut flavours. Zilch. You can’t say I’m not determined!

But one day, we were recommended by a local to go to “THE BEST GELATO PLACE IN FLORENCE”. How could we resist? Gelateria della Passera. We were intrigued – a local’s recommendation must be good. It took us a while to find the place between our useless sense of direction and our inability to properly understand the local’s Italian pronunciation of street names. We eventually found it, funnily enough, right across the road from Quattro Leoni (where you can go enjoy the pear ravioli before treating yourself to some delicious gelato – see our previous post here).

We went inside and the BF ordered his gelato. They only had 6-8 flavours, and each was in a metal tub which you couldn’t see the contents of. I had been told that the best gelato places were the ones that didn’t have bright, colourful and overfilled gelato – these were just typical tourist traps. I watched the lady who was serving us very carefully take the spoon, scoop a flavour of gelato onto the cone and then put the spoon in the basin to be washed. She then took a new spoon, scooped the next flavour and put that in the basin too. We paid for the BF’s ice cream (really cheap too – what a bonus!) and went to sit in the lovely courtyard area while he enjoyed his gelato (and I enjoyed the sun).

After hearing him express his immense pleasure with this gelato (yeh yeh, I’m a super nice GF who allows him to gloat to me about all the treats I cannot enjoy), I began wondering – she had been so careful when serving it, but were they always so careful? They also had only 1 nut flavour (which wasn’t peanuts). With this glimmer of hope, the BF excitedly went to speak to the shopkeeper, who confirmed that they are always careful as they don’t like to mix the flavours (these were true Italians, taking pride in their gelato and not just seeking out tourists). She also said that she had brought out brand new tubs of gelato that morning so the entire tub had been treated by only her, in this careful manner. I took the plunge and ordered myself a vanilla and coffee gelato. I was nervous at first, but I knew that I was being neurotic since I had watched how careful she was. I enjoyed my drooool-worthy gelato and lived to tell the tale! And now I can even say that I got to taste gelato in Italy.

I also enjoyed a soft serve strawberry gelato at La Milkeria (near the Duomo). The BF enjoyed a waffle with white chocolate sauce (which I couldn’t eat because of the Nutella in the vicinity), but the ice cream was served out of a soft serve machine, so was free of cross-contamination risk. This was pretty tasty, but not as delicious as the more authentic gelato from Gelateria della Passera.

I had only one almost run-in with nuts (those sneaky buggers are just everywhere aren’t they). The BF and I were on the hunt for the best Italian hot chocolate. We had heard these were spectacular so, as people obsessed with chocolate (but really, who isn’t?), hunt we did. Unfortunately for us, these famed Italian hot chocolates don’t have much of a presence in summer. Why oh why? I never knew that chocolate (hot or cold) was season-dependent…

We managed to narrow down on a restaurant that was known for their delicious hot chocolates – Rivoire on Palazza Vecchio. And YAY they were serving them in summer. We got a table outside to soak up some sun, looking forward to resting our feet after wayyy too much walking. We both ordered Italian hot chocolates and I told the waiter about my allergy. He responded telling me that I couldn’t have the hot chocolate because it contained “gianduja”. I had never heard of this before. While people do often mistakenly categorise something as an allergen (a common one being sesame, or my weird bean story), chocolate was more likely to contain nuts so I didn’t take the risk.

Believe it or not, gianduja does contain nuts – it is, in fact, a chocolate spread made with hazelnut paste! I guess you learn something new every day (and definitely something in each new city you visit).

I spontaneously made the decision to order a coke zero instead. It tasted mighty fine (though not as fine as the apparently AMAYYYYZING hot chocolate that the BF enjoyed), ice cold and quenched my thirst on the hot summer’s day. Until I got the bill. I knew that you paid a premium for sitting down at restaurants in Italy, especially on the main square. But $9 AUD for a 330 mL of coke was beyooond. In conclusion: Rivoire – definitely worth a visit for the Italian hot chocolates (if you are not allergic to nuts) and the atmosphere, but less so for the coke zero!

Ironically, the only Italian hot chocolate I got to enjoy on this trip was in Paris. Our daily breakfast bakery – Paul’s – served a to-die-for Italian hot chocolate that was made by them and was entirely nut free. I had this a couple of times (I had to restrain myself due to the lactose), so it sort of kinda almost made up for the lack-of in Italy.

A few other tips for travelling to Florence with a nut allergy:

As amazing as the desserts may be, they aren’t worth risking your life over. Make sure you are confident that a place is free of the risk of cross-contamination and that servers/waiters understand your allergy. I felt that the Italians generally had quite a good understanding of allergies, but be sure to judge each situation independently. You are likely to come across restaurants or shops that are safe enough for you to enjoy a few treats. If you are comfortable, then enjoy away!

Don’t just assume that you won’t be able to enjoy anything – be sure to ask, because you never know what you might be able to enjoy!

Force feed your travel partner any dessert that you like the look of, just so you can enjoy it by way of your other senses which, while not nearly as good, is better than nothing 😉

If you are travelling with young children, it can be difficult for them to miss out on those treats that they are eyeing or that others around them are enjoying. The good news is that there are a few options:

There are quite a few restaurants/cafes that serve slurpee/granita drinks that are a nice dessert option and I would decide are safe from an allergy perspective as they are pretty much free of cross-contamination risks (separate machine, aren’t served with hands etc).

If you want to treat your child, take them to a store where they can buy some packaged Italian treats. I particularly liked Alessi Bottiglieria (near the Duomo), which stocks candy, delicious Italian chocolate, hot chocolate sachets, biscuits and every other treat imaginable (predominantly with English ingredients). This way, your child can choose something they like and won’t miss out, and you can feel comfortable at the same time!

In summary, Florence pretty much balances itself out – what we can’t eat by way of desserts, we can enjoy by way of meals. I think that it’s probably much harder to make pasta of the same quality as you may find in Italy, than it would be to make delicious waffles or crepes at home. So be an optimist and enjoy the fact that you can enjoy great Italian food, almost completely worry-free!